


Old Enough To Try Anything Once

by GretchenSinister



Series: My Top 20 Short Gen Fics [19]
Category: Rise of the Guardians (2012)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-03
Updated: 2019-08-03
Packaged: 2020-07-29 21:48:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,087
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20089291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GretchenSinister/pseuds/GretchenSinister
Summary: Original Prompt: "It’s not a big deal, except that everyone seems to think the Boogeyman has a habit of eating children’s hands and feet when they’re left hanging off the bed.Pitch takes quite a bit of offense to that gross misrepresentation of his character.Children don’t even taste good :(.+ Pitch impatiently explaining why North’s Christmas cakes aren’t vegetarian (why does the old man insist on using lard whyyyyyy).++ Jack annoying Pitch with questions about whether he misses bacon/chicken/human sacrifices+++ Sandman is the only one who truly understands."Strangely enough, I got most of the aspects of this prompt, and 2 of 3 bonuses for sure, and maybe 3 of 3 in spirit. Jack wants to know about the hands and feet thing, Pitch doesn’t like this question, and eventually evades it entirely by vanishing into dreamland. There’s a bit of reminiscing with Sandy, as they meet as somewhat antagonistic very old friends (frenemies?).





	Old Enough To Try Anything Once

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on Tumblr on 8/26/2016.

“So I’ve got to ask, I’ve got to get a straight answer, kids find out I know you and they ask this question a _lot_,” Jack says.  
  
Pitch sighs a little. The truce with the Guardians has been wonderful, overall, but having so many conversations with someone like Jack, who’s no longer wary of him at all, can be wearying. Especially since he’s still not sure if telling Jack to bugger off is something he’s allowed to do, or if that’s a privilege reserved to the other Guardians (even if Bunny is the only one who takes advantage of it). “I’m sure this will be awkward, so why don’t you stop with the prelude and just get on with it?”  
  
“Okay, okay, okay,” Jack says. He schools his face into a solemn expression. “Do you eat the hands and feet of children when those hands and feet hang out over the edges of their beds?”  
  
“What!” Pitch clears his throat and tries for something that sounds less like a squawk. “What? I’m vegetarian! Didn’t you notice?”  
  
“Um…” This response clearly isn’t one that Jack had prepared for, which pleases Pitch somewhat, though this doesn’t lessen his indignation at the question.  
  
“Yes!” Pitch goes on. “Any time there’s food served at any Guardian gathering, I thought it would be quite clear that I avoided meat. Take North’s Christmas cakes—now that I’m allowed to, I’d stuff my face with anything from the Workshop’s kitchens that had to do with Christmas, there’s no way it could be bad, but North uses lard to make them, so I don’t! And, yes, I’ve talked to North about this before, so don’t tell me to do that. He says he has to do things traditionally or else they won’t be as good. Also, it would be a distraction from what you asked me in the first place.”  
  
Jack narrows his eyes and nods slowly. “Yeah…okay…wait. So your response to my question about you eating hands and feet was that you were a vegetarian. Does that mean that if you weren’t a vegetarian, you _would_ eat hands and feet?”  
  
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Pitch says. “Anyway, you have the straight answer you wanted. I don’t eat hands and feet, because I’m a vegetarian. Anyway, the average raw hands and feet of a child…” He shudders. “You’re the one who encourages them to run around barefoot who knows where. It would be disgusting.”  
  
“Yeah, logical, but I still think my other question is worth an answer! I mean, were you always a vegetarian? I think that’s important because it seems like you don’t really have a line between eating people and eating other kinds of meat, and—”  
  
Pitch realizes that even if he might not be able to tell Jack to go away, _he_ could vanish from the conversation. “Goodbye,” he says, and passes through to the place he knows Jack would look for him last.  
  


* * *

  
  
He arrives in ankle-deep water and curses under his breath. He knows he didn’t miscalculate his location. Sandy just changes the shoreline to make sure that Pitch gets inconveniently wet whenever he arrives in dreamland. He stomps off toward the palace, hoping that this time he’ll be able to track some seawater into those golden halls.  
  


* * *

  
  
_Why not just answer his questions?_ Sandy asks as he generously offers Pitch a cup of Pitch’s third-least-favorite tea.   
  
“Because he wasn’t asking honestly,” Pitch says. “He just wanted to wind me up. Getting into the details of the human sacrifices—he just wouldn’t have been interested in the history. He wouldn’t have been interested in what I really had to say. And I doubt he would have paid attention when I told him that they really were very easy to give up.”  
  
Sandy nods, and a faraway look comes into his eyes. _You really don’t miss it at all? It’s just that no one ever offered me any…it wasn’t quite the same, sharing with you._  
  
“I—well, I always made sure to invite you while they were very fresh,” Pitch says. “Does it really bother you that you never got those kinds of offerings? I know you love what you do, and there’s nothing about you that would lead people to give you the same kind of sacrifices they gave me. You’d have to change immensely, and even if you did, the world just isn’t like that anymore.”  
  
Sandy nods again, then shrugs. _Maybe I just miss the way you had a better sense of humor, then. But, no doubt it’s good that the world’s changed. The sacrifices never altered our behaviors._  
  
“Except that we ended up spending more time together.”  
  
_I don’t stop you from visiting now._  
  
“You change the shoreline so I always get my feet wet and you choose your tea variety specifically to irritate me.”  
  
_Dreamland shifts,_ Sandy notes with a grin. _And how was I supposed to remember little things like your tea preferences after you murdered me? I had an entire brain to put back together, and I had to do it in such a hurry!_  
  
“Oh, cut it out,” Pitch says. “What if I started appearing directly in your palace? What if I brought a coffee maker here?”  
  
_What if I brought some comfortable furniture to that horrible cave you insist on living in?_  
  
“People would talk,” Pitch says.  
  
_Well, then we could never tell them about the sacrifices. Why, they might start thinking that we’re old enough to have tried absolutely anything at least once._  
  
Pitch snorts. “Then again, I do need to repay Jack for all the discomfort he’s caused me since the truce started. I think you should bring up the sacrifices.”  
  
Sandy grins. _I don’t know if he’s recovered from learning that I’m responsible for more than just children’s dreams, though._  
  
“Oh, excuse me,” Pitch says. “Of course you can wait until an appropriate time. I’d hate to deny you another chance to completely shock Jack.”  
  
Sandy’s grin grows wider. _It will be so sad when I run out of ways to do that._  
  
“I’m sure you’ll always manage to find something, as long as he keeps reacting in a way that amuses you,” Pitch says.  
  
_Thank you for your confidence in me._ Sandy places one small hand over his heart.  
  
Pitch rolls his eyes, but after a moment or two, can’t help but join an addendum of a small smile to that expression. Poor, poor Jack. He’ll have to make sure he’s around to watch every revelation. 


End file.
